Us Again
by Angie72
Summary: Ezra needs Aria to help him through a life altering revelation.


The techno ring of my cell phone wakes me out of a deep sleep. The first good sleep I had gotten in quite sometime. Between A, losing Ezra, Mom leaving, and Hanna's Mom being arrested, sleep seemed to elude me on a nightly basis. I guess the crap between Connor and I exhausted me. Not to mention my encounter with Ezra afterward.

As I pick up the phone, expecting it to be Spencer with more theories about A, I realize its Ezra's number.

"Hello?"

"Aria?" His voice is trembling, almost crying.

"Are you home?" I ask him.

"Yes…"

Before he can say anything else, I am already out of bed and dressed…

"I'll be there in five"…..

When he opens the door, I can see his red eyes and tear stained face.

"What's going on?"

"I'm sorry to wake you…"

"It's fine, Ezra….what's happened?"

"It's Malcolm…."

"Oh my God….is he ok, is he hurt? Do you need me to drive you somewhere?"

"He's not mine, Aria", Ezra blurts out in pain. "He never was….." Ezra walks over to the couch and falls into it, defeated.

"What are you talking about? Of course he's yours, Maggie told you so."

"She lied, Aria. She's been lying about Malcolm his entire life."

"What? Why? What good could it possibly do her to lie about him? Lie about him being yours?"

"She said, she did it, because she knew my mother. And she knew, that if she told me the baby was mine, she knew my mother would take care of it. Give her money and a place to live to make sure Malcolm was taken care of."

I sit down on the couch next to him, in shock. Could Maggie really be that deceitful?

"Why is she telling you this now? What prompted her confession?"

"Malcolm had fallen, again, off of the monkey bars at the playground. Very Kramer vs. Kramer…remember that scene?"

I nod my head. That was a movie Ezra suggest we watch one night, not even thinking about the stuff my parents were going through at the time.

"So we took him back to the ER. Keep in mind, we've been frequent fliers there. It seems as though we are there once a month or so…." As I watch Ezra's face, he begins to smile, thinking about the little boy.

"I'm surprised they haven't called Child Protective Services," he chuckles. "Luckily, most of the doctors and nurses have sons, so they know how it is." Suddenly, his face falls, and he is back in reality. "Anyway, Malcolm fell asleep after some stitches in his chin, and Maggie had stepped out for some coffee. I grabbed his chart to look it over. I've gotten pretty good at reading those. But for some reason, this time, I checked his blood type. AB….."

"….and yours is…."

"O…"

"…so…."

"So I can't be his father….."

A single tear streams down his face, his face begins to turn, and soon, he is sobbing, head in his hands.

I pull him to me, and hold him. I just hold him and let him cry. He had done this for me so many times….

"I'm so sorry….." is all I can say.

After a few minutes, he finally is calm enough to finish his story

"At the moment the realization hit me, Maggie walked back in to the room. When I looked at her, she knew exactly what was going on. Her face went white. We went out in to the waiting room, and she told me, everything."

"Ezra, I am so sorry…"

"I honestly, didn't believe her at first. I thought the chart was wrong. So I took one of the swabs in the room. I ran it along his lips, and then I did the same to myself. And I took it to the lab. I gave the guy $100 to speed up the test and give me the results." Ezra's head falls in to his hands again.

"So, where are they now? Maggie and Malcolm…."

"I made Maggie tell Malcolm. He had never really understood the whole situation, anyway. He still called me Ezra. I told Maggie, that I never wanted to see her again. I told her, I would always be there for Malcolm if he needed me. That she could contact me via email, but she and I would never speak again."

"But, Ezra, if the money from your mother stopped when you contacted Maggie and found out about Malcolm, why did she stay? Why not tell the truth then?"

"She told me, it was a way for Malcolm to finally have a father figure in his life, and for her to not have to carry the load on her own. She finally had a bit of freedom. She could go places and do things, and know that Malcolm was being taken care of. Not to mention, I started giving her money each week, too. For whatever Malcolm needed that her paycheck didn't cover."

Ezra turned to me, and looked me in the eye, straight in to my soul, as he always could.

"Aria, when I left the hospital tonight, after the whole thing was over, all I could think of was you."

"Me?"

"You told me, that day on the bench, that we had been chasing what we had before Malcolm. For as much as I love him, and will miss him, I can't go back to trying to be his father. Maggie decided that she was going to contact Malcolm's real father. I'll miss him, but I realize, we can go back. Our lives can go back to the way it was before Malcolm. Stay with me, please?" His eyes, pleading with me as much as his voice. "Stay with me tonight…I've missed you, and, I don't want to be alone."

My head was spinning with every word he said. Could it really go back to the way it was? The mere thought of it made me excited and happy. I had missed Ezra so much. The last kiss we shared on the stair landing at school runs through my mind everyday. Every time I walk in to class and see him standing there, I am transported back to that day.

School…

"Ezra, how can we go back?" I say, as I start pacing around his apartment. "You're my teacher again. Hackett already knows that you and I dated while you were at Hollis. He warned me that if he found out we were still dating, there would be consequences. You can't give up your job, AGAIN, just to date me!"

A sigh escapes Ezra's lips. He hadn't thought of that.

After a few seconds, he stands, walks over to me, and takes my hands in to his.

"Aria, I don't know. I don't have all the answers. You told me once, to not worry about the future, to just be in the here and now. Can we do that, please? Just for tonight. For the next six hours, can we just be us again?"

His hands move from mine, to my face, as he draws it near to his own. Softly, he places his lips on mine, and the feeling that I had missed so desperately, is back. The feeling of warmth, safety, passion, and love, all wrapped in to one. The feeling I can only describe, as Ezra.

When he pulls away, open my eyes slowly, and smile at the sight of him so close.

He smiles back, and gently leads me to his couch.

"Us again", I say softly, and he wraps me in his arms.


End file.
